


Brothers In Mind

by themusketeerofrohan



Series: First Impressions [1]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: AU, Angst, Childhood, Crossover, Drift Compatibility, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pacific Rim - Freeform, Pacific Rim AU, Repressed Memories, ahhh I've had this in mind for so long
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-20
Updated: 2014-02-20
Packaged: 2018-01-13 04:20:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1212478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themusketeerofrohan/pseuds/themusketeerofrohan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Breach has been open for years, but now the Musketeers have joined the the fight, who knows what will happen?<br/>Porthos and Aramis must face the monsters within and without, and neither can do it alone. This is their first meeting, their first chapter in the fight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Brothers In Mind

**Author's Note:**

> I love Pacific Rim AU's, and I love The Musketeers. I was surprised to find one not already on here! So I decided to write my own.  
> Massive kudos go to miss-aramis on tumblr, who helped me so much with it (she also made some INCREDIBLE graphics that you should go and see.)  
> (Edit: Fixed the page formatting! Was my first work on AO3, got some teething issues!)

The first time Aramis steps into the simulator, he feels like he’s come home.

Porthos just feels scared.

The Drift itself doesn’t terrify him- heaven knows, he has one of the best combat records in the Academy, he is confident he’ll be able to take down a Kaiju on his first run- it’s that expanse of pure memory, things he’d rather forget, things he wishes would stay hidden, exposed again. You can get lost in that kind of mental soup. He can’t afford to lose himself: too many candidates are cut at this point, and he needs to complete Pons training to become a Ranger.

He grits him teeth and rolls his shoulders as the technician fiddles with something just out of his sight. A static shock (he hopes its static) makes him tense up, and the techie mutters some apology. It’s only a step in the process, Porthos tells himself repeatedly. The Drift must become easier the more you do it, and besides, the Drift isn’t meant to be experienced alone. The person next to him is compatible on paper, in the Kwoon, and he’ll bear half the load. This thought makes him smile, and the techie in the booth blushes slightly before she presses the series of switches that send Porthos into the blackness of his past, to meet the demons whom he’ll fight in his future and the memories of the person standing next to him.

Porthos met Aramis on his first day at the Academy, and like most other candidates, was blinded by the sheer charm of the man. He seemed to always be ready with a quippy line, whilst able to maintain a sincere rapport with most of the intake. It wasn’t a surprise that he was one of the first to be paired provisionally after weeks of banter, combat in the Kwoon, and tests. It was a surprise however, that he was paired with Porthos. Porthos wasn’t sure about the match himself. Aramis was a decent guy, who could hold his own against Porthos’ sheer mass and wasn’t bad in a fight when they were out on the town. But. There was a notion he held onto that your partner was more than just a friend- it was on a different plane entirely. And Porthos hadn’t felt any special connection with the guy- no “frission” like all the rumours had it. But they’d see after this run what the fates thought. Blackness swallows him.

It’s like bathing in pure sunshine. Aramis dreamily watches his history blow past in soft focus, pink hued. He could get used to this, he thinks idly, flicking through past romances, old flames frozen forever in a moment of ecstasy. Though time is hard to measure in the neural bridging stage, he begins to feel concerned about how long it’s taking for his prospective partner to appear. He should be here by now.

Then darkness. It’s cold.

He feels his brain, his being, crash. He’s a child again, shivering in the cold air as strange people crowd past him. Screaming. So much screaming. He crushes his hands into his ears, fighting to block out the confusion.

_Mami!_

A strong hand grips his wrist. Through tears he looks up at this stranger, features indistinguishable through the smoke and the shadows cast by the dancing flames. He struggles, attempting to break free and run home, away from strangers, from monsters out of science fiction, back to his bed.

_Mami!_

And he’s back in the pod. The clinical whiteness makes him blink, and he gasps as his mind expands to accommodate the new monsters of his partner. He wasn’t finished- he’s not safe. Sirens are blaring, red lights flashing. A small part of Porthos wryly comments on the lack of difference between the current situation and the nightmare Porthos was just in. But the voice is swiftly dealt with, put in its cage. It’s not relevant. All that is important is fitting in the harness next to him.

There must be some flaw in him, he wonders, as he struggles to extract himself from the tendrils and tangles of wire, grunting in pain as something sticky tears off hair. Some flaw of genetics that makes him seek out the danger instead of running from it. But this is a different fight, a whole new ball park of sensitivity. It’s a matter of honour, of not leaving someone who has now become part of him (for better or worse) in the hell Porthos was dragged out of.

Aramis struggles and struggles but he can’t escape. The monster is getting closer, blue strands dangling from his mouth like the sweets his mother used to buy him from the shop just off the plaza. He giggles, in a moment of self-awareness. He’s going crazy. It’s finally happening. The rose-tinted facade couldn’t hide it forever. The pressure has moved from his wrist, crushing his chest. He can’t breathe. He’s surrounded by the flashing lights of the simulator again: blue, green, red. Red? Something must have gone wrong with the machine. Aramis fumbles to get up, to help fix the problem, but the constriction from the Drift hasn’t gone. He looks down, and through the muzziness he can see a muscled arm supporting him, crushing him. Ah. So he is the problem. Shame comes crashing down on him. The realisation that he’s probably failed Pons, that he’ll never become a pilot, makes him want to vomit. The person who the arm belongs to appears to realise this instantly, and hauls him none too gently over to a less high tech surface, where Aramis is profusely sick.

Time passes in a haze of alarms, shouting, blissful silence. When Aramis comes to, he’s in his bunk. There’s someone sitting at the end of his bed, and it’s Porthos, and Aramis has to get up to apologise for the mess he’s got them into. That was a mistake.

“Woah there.”

Porthos grabs the man’s wrist as the idiot attempts to sit up and nearly faints off the bed.

“People don’t just recover immediately after chasing the R.A.B.I.T for the first time!”

“I knew that.”

The poor guy is slurring as he sits back down against the pillows, Porthos notes. He’d offered to watch the invalid while the high-ups cleaned the pod, filled out paperwork and did everything but care for the person who’d confronted their worst nightmare in high definition. That was Porthos’ guess anyway. But then, the high-ups didn’t know Aramis like he did now.

Aramis thought the big guy looked whacked. But also strangely happy. His mind wasn’t functioning at full capacity but he was fairly sure that your provisional partner failing the first neural bridging wasn’t the best thing to happen to someone. Good news of some sort? Well, good for him. Aramis had failed his Pons, failed his mother, and Porthos himself for God’s sake. He furrowed his brow in a moment of confusion as his brain, racing to catch up, noticed something odd.

Before the blackness hit, that face had been there in various states of age, happiness and grief. He hadn’t noticed at the time because it was like this person, this man sitting quietly and stalwartly at the end of his bunk had always been in his life, had fit so comfortably into his memories that the “turmoil” and “horrible disturbance” the trainees had been warned about proved to be falsehoods. The big man who’d always pushed him to the limit in the Kwoon, the close acquaintance who he’d drunk under the table, was now the boy who’d worked three jobs at school to help his mother pay the rent. The teenager who cheated at cards in the street to bring home the money he needed to pay for a sister’s hospital treatment. The man who like him had seen things that children shouldn’t experience. Aramis looked up, and their eyes met and their minds touched, and Porthos was lost. But he was home simultaneously.

“That’s right, idiot. We’re Drift compatible.”

And without having to ask, Aramis watched Porthos lean forward and punch him gently in the shoulder as the big man replied to the silent question.

“And we get to have another go.”


End file.
